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Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza!

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The Opposition with Jordan Klepper: LGBT acceptance plummets in America

Minute Physics: Why is Relativity Hard? Special Relativity Chapter 1

Young Turks: Florida anti-voting rights law found unconstitutional.

State of The Dotard Трамп’s Mental Health:

Jimmy Kimmel: The week in unnecessary censorship

Mental Floss: The Olympics.

VOX: The problem with online charter schools.

Political Grammys:

Slate: A brief history of fat and why we hate it.

VOX: What BMI doesn’t tell you about health

The Opposition with Jordan Klepper: Passing Judgment on Pope Francis, Tony Perkins and Google Home

Samantha Bee: Forced arbitration.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Comments

  1. 1

    Beginning to see what would have happened if the Republicans had the gavel during Watergate.

  2. 2

    @1 how about if they got their hands on a gas chamber. Wake up America. You got people such as doctors and such that would watch the people marched right to the chamber.

  3. 3

    If you can pull off Watergate or Russiagate, there is no stopping whatever else you want to do. It’s coming. The Stock Market will perform great at that time. Good buying and selling opportunities at that time.

  4. 4

    And let’s not forget Shortbus. His silver lining, after watching the people marched to the chamber, would be that one could also find themselves on the Planet Moronassis without their hermetically sealed life vest and things could be much worse.

  5. 5

    Over Five Million

    Thats how he got so “rich”.

    He just fucks everyone over. The entire point of his gaining the Presidency is to fuck people over. He can now, literally fuck the entire world over, but he’s going to start with the United States of America because he’s a vindictive, greedy psychopath and it is his personal prerogative to fuck as many people over as he can before he keels over from acute subdural hemorrhage.

    I’m almost entirely convinced that the PeePee tape is real, and there is probably a lot worse than that out there. He did import an awful lot of underage “models” from Eastern Europe back in the day. That’s how he met his wife. She was 13 when they first met.

    Funny thing, under his new immigration rules, she’s now very eligible for deportation herself.

  7. 7

    So was this guy. Chronically. He was a bipolar manic-depressive with a death wish, an accident-prone alcoholic, a gun nut who liked to kill animals and was fascinated by war and violence, and a narcissistic asshole who hated his parents, probably himself too, and made life miserable for everyone around him until he blew his own brains out.

    http://www.independent.co.uk/n.....94619.html

    With him, appearances were misleading, so I’ll bet he was a closet Republican, too. In a slightly later time, he and Trump probably would have gotten along famously.

  8. 8

    Most Republicans have evil in their hearts, which is why they go to church for absolution so much, so it’s not surprising they’re closing ranks behind a child-raping, draft-dodging, mobster traitor. After all, these are people who’d sell their own children for a signature on another Tax Cut For the Rich (TM, pat. pend.).

    So it’s not surprising their Talking Points Memo (isn’t that name already taken? Here? https://talkingpointsmemo.com/) is self-defeating and full of internal contradictions. For starters:

    “The document contends that the FBI relied excessively on an ex-British spy whose opposition research was funded by Democrats when it applied for a surveillance warrant on a Trump campaign associate. Yet it also says the investigation into potential Trump ties to Russia actually began several months earlier — ‘triggered,’ it says, by information involving a separate campaign aide.”

    And then …

    “The warrant authorizing the FBI to monitor the communications of campaign adviser Carter Page [was] approved by a judge on four occasions … and signed off on by Mr. Trump’s hand-picked deputy attorney general ….”

    Who? Oh, he doesn’t know that guy now. In any case, what it boils down to is …

    “‘Having decided to cherry-pick, the Nunes team picked a bunch of the wrong cherries for its own narrative,’ Matthew Waxman, a Columbia University professor and former Bush administration official, wrote in an email.”

    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/not-all-details-in-gop-memo-help-undercut-muellers-russia-probe/

    Talking Points Memo (c) calls the GOP’s talking points memo “a big self own,” summing it up as follows: “As definitive proof of anti-Trump bias among FBI and DOJ leadership, it’s … a bust … a good amount of the information included actually undercuts the Republican authors’ own conclusions.”

    Shooting themselves in both feet, as it were.

    https://talkingpointsmemo.com/fivepoints/how-nunes-memo-doesnt-add-up

    In other words, this gang can’t shoot straight.

  9. 9

    @ 7 RR:

    With him, appearances were misleading, so I’ll bet he was a closet Republican, too. In a slightly later time, he and Trump probably would have gotten along famously.

    Hemingway was bipolar, and an alcoholic. It would be quite probable that he had a massive hangover the day he blew his brains out and just couldn’t take it.

    His granddaughter, to me one of the most beautiful women of her generation, had the same issues, and came to a similar end. That shit runs in families.

    As for a conjectural relationship with Fat Donny, it would be much more likely that he’d be denouncing him for the imbecile and traitor he is. Hemingway fought against the Fascists in Spain during the Civil War, and was nearly imprisoned for it by the United States Government. Tail-Gunner Joe tried to have him deported, and made some rather ham-handed attempts to have Hemingway’s books banned. Tail-Gunner Joe was a self-loathing homosexual, was also a hard core alcoholic, even worse than Hemingway, who had probably completely lost his mind during his short career as a U.S. Army airman even as he had never actually served in combat. So take that for what you will.

    The Conservatives in America have always been utter phonies, liars, drunks and thieves. Their whole paradigm is based on hiding from the world by accusing everyone else around them of being exactly what they are themselves.

    Hemingway hated such individuals, and wrote about them extensively.

    Conservative authoritarianism is the primary refuge of criminals. Prisons are full of right-wing bank robbers, murderers, rapists, religionists and wanna-be book burners. The ones that somehow avoid being caught are the people that hate the idea that their inner anarchists might someday be held to account for the crimes they have or want to commit. Their open support for child molesters, homicidal maniacs and fraudsters bears that out.

  10. 10

    ” … Devin Nunes admitted on Friday that he did not view the underlying intelligence on which he based a memo that accuses the FBI and the Justice Department of improperly surveilling Trump associates during the 2016 election.”

    https://www.aol.com/article/news/2018/02/02/devin-nunes-admits-he-didnt-view-the-underlying-intelligence-his-memo-was-based-on/23351741/

    Roger Rabbit Commentary: This is like writing a book report without having read the book. But we shouldn’t be surprised. After all, Republicans are cheaters, and aren’t known for their intellectualism. They’re blowhards, and little else.

  11. 11

    Now wait for Puddy to accuse me of “plagiarism” for quoting from an article written by someone else. This from a freak who posts excerpts from other posters’ comments (including mine) without putting quote marks around them, and sans any other attribution.

  12. 12

    @9 You’re probably right. Seriously dysfunctional people are scattered across the ideological spectrum. These days, though, they gravitate to the GOP. Maybe that’s because Republicans own most of the churches and distilleries.

  13. 13

    And so I tweeted, you ready? “I was 35 years old when Bill Clinton, Ark. Attorney General raped me and Hillary tried to silence me. I am now 73….it never goes away.”
    …
    Then Hillary Clinton removed the statement from her website that said women have the right to be believed.
    Yeah, after my tweet.

    http://nymag.com/daily/intelli.....-know.html

    I suppose it would be breaking my word to Steve if I brought up someone who will never be First Gentleman. Although it’s clearly grey zone, as Gentlemen Don’t Rape.

  14. 14

    @13 Stalking Hillary again, I see. Doesn’t she have a restraining order against you by now?

  15. 15

    There’s no reason she should forgive until he acknowledges the truth.

    And the one thing I’m afraid of is that I will go to my grave without forgiving Bill Clinton. It’s just something that I can’t do. My pastor has asked if we need to pray about this, if there is something we need to do to give me peace. And I, just, I’m not there.

    Perhaps it’s enough that Clinton – both Clintons, actually – will never experience peace, either.

    They’ll experience Trump instead.

  16. 16

    @ 13:

    Butbutbut BUT CLINTON!

    You really don’t have anything to say, do you. Slick Willy hasn’t been President for over 18 years now. His wife lost her chance in spite of being the most qualified and credentialed candidate, to a man who is a well-known deadbeat and thief and has thusfar spent over a third of his term on vacation at his own resorts, at the cost to taxpayers of over a $Million per day, funds that go straight into his own pocket.

  19. 19

    From a former prosecutor accustomed to obtaining search warrants from judges based on probable cause:

    “The number and suspicious nature of Carter Page’s activities and contacts with Russian operatives during the Trump campaign would have caused any reasonable judge to issue a surveillance warrant.”

    https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/02/opinions/prosecutor-take-on-nunes-memo-callan-opinion/index.html

    Roger Rabbit Commentary: Maybe we shouldn’t have secret courts empowered to issue secret surveillance warrants based on secret evidence in secret proceedings. But, you know, that was a Republican baby of the Shrub era. Now they’re complaining about their own creation?

  20. 20

    @19:

    Yes, the Patriot Act needs to be repealed. The Republicans used 9/11 to increase the power of government. Democrats went along as long as all those TSA agents and others had government jobs.

    Yep, the Patriot Act was a classic example of bipartisanship in order to expand government and support the political goals of both parties.

    Never let a good crisis go to waste. Use it to advance your agenda.

  21. 21

    “This from a freak who posts excerpts from other posters’ comments (including mine) without putting quote marks around them, and sans any other attribution.”

    I’ve never said anything about that because for anyone visiting these threads it must look like he’s arguing with himself. They must conclude that he’s batshit fucking insane which, of course, he is. What a loon!

  22. 22

    That said, I hope the loon’s friends didn’t lynch him last night. Heh. But one of these days it’s gonna happen.

  23. 23

    “I’m almost entirely convinced that the PeePee tape is real”

    Being spanked by a porn star with a Forbes magazine is damn near as funny.

  24. 24

    “I suppose it would be breaking my word to Steve if I brought up someone who will never be First Gentleman.”

    Not really. But it could get boring real quick.

  25. 25

    20,
    How peculiar then it must seem to you that your beloved hooting mob of racist orange Roypublican baboons (very fine people) haven’t made so much as one single squeak about repealing or diluting the Patriot Act or any of the dozens of subsequent, tacked on amendments usually pushed through during redundant Roypublican government shutdown threats (deficits matter until they don’t). Instead, in the midst of a smoke screen of obvious committee leadership lying about classified intelligence (populist outrage over the “rights” and “freedoms” of Russian spies) and mockingly naked partisanship, their only objective seems to be to attack very good, hard working, law enforcement professionals in order to enable your Shit-Gibbon Prince to pre-empt any further independent inquiries into his criminal activities.

    Ehrm, your bothsiderism-bot needs a better script. If you Russian contractors really want to weaken FBI counter-intelligence you need to be a bit more creative. This shit is just clumsy.

    #FREECARTERPAGE!

  26. 26

    Amongst the stupidity that is all Trump and the bs around “the memo”, the Minute Physics link about Special Relativity was a nice change (thanks Darryl for posting it).

    Back in the day when I was taking college courses, I had one on Special Relativity, and as the video points out, it is a somewhat difficult concept to grasp as most of it is counterintuitive to the way we live in a non-relativistic world. At the time, when Einstein make is discovery, it was truly genius. Such a simple and elegant solution, so much so, the common man can understand the relation between energy and mass.

    With that said, while I can understand Special Relativity, I will never be able to understand how someone can support such a fucking self-absorbed racist pissant that Donald Trump is, as the POTUS. Our country deserves so much better.

  27. 27

    “They’ll experience Trump instead.”

    Sadly, so does the rest of the nation. I have no love for the Clintons. But the destruction of our national institutions and the fall of our nation from world leader to despised stooge of Putin’s Russia is simply too high a price to be paid for your tax cut and your wetdreams of the Clintons.

  28. 28

    In Florida, the Brightline passenger train has faced intense opposition, and now the most active opponent is taking advantage of recent incidents to take their opposition to the next level. Since it started running, a couple cases of people getting hit by the train, but it appears they all thought they could beat the train. Now Citizens Against Rail Expansion in Florida has made a statement about the need for pedestrians to be safe walking along the tracks. The Association of American Railroads, the American Public Transportation Association, and the Rail Passenger Association have issued a statement condemning this wreck less action by rail opponents, who have tried, without success, to get politicians and regulators, both in Washington and Tallahassee to block Brightline.
    https://www.aar.org/newsandevents/Press-Releases/Pages/There-is-Only-One-Message-Stay-Off-the-Tracks.aspx

  29. 29

    @28

    Yes, the simple solution is of course, “Stay off the Tracks.” However that said, you can’t fix stupid.

    When people start off with, “I thought I could outrun it.” and “I didn’t think a train would be coming.” The problem isn’t with the train, the problem is with the idiots thinking. How hard is it to grasp the concept of F=ma? How hard is it to grasp the concepts of odds and statistics? Apparently it is quite hard given the number of accidents.

  30. 30

    Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the House Intelligence Committee chair Rep. Devin “Sweet Brown” Nunes (Traitor) CA,
    “Ain’t Nobody Got Time Fo Dat!”

    “Did you read the actual FISA applications?”
    “No, I didn’t.”

    That’s all for now, folks. Thanks, you’ve been a great audience! He’ll be here all week. All year, in fact. Maybe even forever if loyal patriotic American voters don’t wake the fuck up and actually vote. It’s still not too late!

  31. 31

    The loon will soon be back and he’ll be flinging HATE! like a monkey flings shit. I bet we’ll see another triple post like we did the other day. My goodness! So much HATE! How does the loon live with himself?

  32. 32

    I saw my name mentioned in one of the comments posted by shortbus last night. As with the rest of his comments, I didn’t bother to read it. Although I make an exception for the hate-filled loon, I don’t get off on humiliating the mentally deficient.

  33. 33

    The Libertardian Shyster representing the Merchant of Terrorism who illegally manufactured and sold armor piercing incendiary rounds to the Las Vegas sniper is being funded by…
    get ready for it…
    you know what’s coming…

    …the NRA.
    I know. Shocking, right?
    #youbuiltthattoo

  34. 34

    We are so fucked.

    Indeed, White House National Security Council senior director for Asian affairs Matthew Pottinger reportedly said in a recent closed-door meeting with US experts on Korean Peninsula issues that a limited strike on the North might help in the midterm elections.

    Count on the Derp Armies of Konsheeenshus Konsarvatives to defend this madness.
    #youbuiltthattoo

  35. 35

    @26 “Our country deserves so much better.”

    Actually, only 65,853,516 of us do.

    The other 62,984,825 deserve what they voted for.

  36. 36

    @34 If you were Kim and your country was bombed, probably including a “decapitation strike” aimed at killing you, what would you do?

    If a felon gets in a shootout with the cops, and figures they’re going to kill him anyway, won’t he try to take as many of them with him as he can?

    I don’t see a difference.

  37. 37

    I❤️Radio FKA ClearChannel, consolidator of radio stations, (ever notice how every town you go to has a JackFM? And a Movin’?) and syndicator of lots of RW radio shows is in deep trouble.

    Stock is now at lowest rating on S&P and analysts predict a bankruptcy filing any day now.

    iHeartCommunications has failed to make a $106 million February 1 interest payment to holders of its 14% senior unsecured notes due 2021, entering instead into a customary 30-day grace period with its lenders.

    They are the biggest player in media and a breakup and sell off might reopen the door to more local control of airwaves. Or Sinclair could be the new dominant player forcing their views on listeners.

  39. 39

    I’ve been tracking my Federal Taxes since 1991. I have figures from 1989 to 2016. Looking forward to add 2017 soon. And then I can’t wait for 2018!

    The data is as follows with percentages (averaged) in the following order – % of taxable income to Adjusted Gross Income, % of Taxes paid to Adjusted Gross Income, and then % of taxes paid on Taxable Income.

    From 1989 to 1992 – 66%, 10%, 16%
    From 1993 to 2000 – 70%, 13%, 18%
    From 2001 to 2008 – 73%, 14%, 19%
    From 2009 to 2016 – 80%, 16%, 20%

    Not sure why everyone gets their panties all wet over taxes.

    More people should track what they pay. My sister always says 50% of her paycheck goes to taxes….either she is doing something wrong, or she is just ill informed. She speaks of all taxes not just Federal Income tax, but even still I think she would be hard pressed to get to 50%.

  40. 40

    @speakerryan

    You know what else I can do with $1.50/week?

    Save it up and take a family of four to the movies in December. Once. Popcorn no drinks

  41. 41

    Don’t know about you guys, but I have no problem dying by a NK nuke strike….It beats suffering a slow death of thirst, or a slow agonizing death of strife by white supremacists, or even living without being free.

  42. 42

    41,
    that assumes Kim’s systems are accurate. But the fact is they don’t need to be. Given the kind of low yielding devices he might be able to mount on a missile of sufficient range, most of the damage will come from widespread fallout and contamination. Vast areas rendered toxic, huge masses of people fleeing the effects, and slow death for millions.

  43. 43

    29) Plus, Brightline and the Florida East Coast Railway have been investing in safety upgrades, including quad gates at crossings.

    https://youtu.be/w4ql_k3QmHQ

    Operation Lifesaver is just going to have to air more PSA’s and put up more billboard ads.

  44. 44

    Now wait for Puddy to accuse me of “plagiarism” for quoting from an article written by someone else.

    Once again the senile idiot wabbit proves senility is an insidious disease. Puddy didn’t accuse you of “”plagiarism” for quoting from an article written by someone else.” Puddy accused you of “plagiarism” for quoting from an article written by someone else without the proper attribution. You would write paragraph after paragraph of guttersnipe commentary and there were no attribution links! Hence the PuddyComment that smacked your silly senile shitty ASS back into last week!

    Puddy gives you the links where Puddy gives you the information.

    FACTS… never a friend to an HA DUMMOCRETIN!

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

    Till Next Time!

  47. 47

    Why on earth does the asylum give the loon internet privileges?? Well, thinking about it, I suppose they have to actually live with him and maybe it’s the only way to get him to stop spewing hate at them for a few hours each week. One can only imagine what that’d be like. It’s bad enough when he shows up here, screaming hate at us through the internet tubes SAD!.

  48. 48

    Oh, look at that. The hate-filled loon and his exploding head posted a link. Too bad nobody ever clicks on them. That’s so…SAD!

  50. 50

    Wow, Puddy lives free in shitstain steve’s head.

    No breath there! Shitstain steve’s leetle brain is dead on arrival!

    Till Next Time!

  52. 52

    @44 Don’t worry, Spud, the rest of the posters here understand why someone like you who doesn’t know

    (a) what quote marks are, or
    (b) how to click on a link

    might conclude I didn’t attribute. So you don’t need to explain yourself.

  53. 53

    @47 “Why on earth does the asylum give the loon internet privileges??”

    They don’t. He sneaks out at night through a sewer pipe.

  56. 56

    @42,

    No need for accurate targeting if you go for EMP.

    North Korean EMP Attack Would Cause Mass U.S. Starvation, Says Congressional Report

    A new congressional report contends that a North Korean electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack on the U.S. would ultimately wipe out 90% of the population.

    …Super-EMP weapons are designed to produce a high level of gamma rays, which generate the sort of high-frequency electromagnetic pulse that is most damaging to the broadest range of electronics, the report concludes.

    And if the EMP device just happens to be part onboard an orbiting satellite, North Korea need only detonate the device remotely via encoded signal. Pry, Chief of Staff of the now de-funded Congressional EMP Commission, told me that at an altitude of 300 kilometers, the resulting electromagnetic pulse would affect all 48 contiguous states.

    http://www.forbes.com

    So if you are NK, would you target a couple of cities or the whole power grid of the lower 48?

  57. 57

    “The U.S. government is set to borrow nearly $1 trillion this year, an 84 percent jump from last year

    It was another crazy news week, so it’s understandable if you missed a small but important announcement from the Treasury Department: The federal government is on track to borrow nearly $1 trillion this fiscal year — Trump’s first full year in charge of the budget.

    That’s almost double what the government borrowed in fiscal year 2017.

    Here are the exact figures: The U.S. Treasury expects to borrow $955 billion this fiscal year, according to a documents released Wednesday. It’s the highest amount of borrowing in six years, and a big jump from the $519 billion the federal government borrowed last year.”

    WaPo

    So who gets the trillion and who gets to pay it back?
    Any guesses?

  58. 58

    @57 Easy. Our wealthy radiologist gets the money. Those here at HA who work hard and yet still struggle to make ends meet are required to give it to him as he laughs at them.

    Next question?

  60. 60

    I’m not saying Carter Page is a turncoat who spies for the Russians and helps them subvert our government. All I’m saying is, if I were the FBI, I’d get a FISA warrant too. Just to make sure he’s not doing anything more nefarious than, say, helping Trump launder Russian mob cash. Heck, he may not even be doing that, but how could the FBI find out without surveillance?

  61. 61

    A very old method of killing someone in China:
    Death by a thousand cuts.

    It is apparent, that with their domestic patent laws, they can buy out and completely subvert the standards of quality as set in nations like Germany and the United States. What once was a highly regarded product reputation can be destroyed simply by the manufacture of counterfeit goods that are manufactured by Chinese State owned companies, sheltered by shell companies in third-party nations where the banking institutions are unregulated or where the investment banking laws are so lax as to be ineffective as a regulatory institution. Where there is no rule of law, there is no way for anyone to petition for redress of a grievance, especially in the realm of patent law.

    China is buying up companies around the world, including the United States, not so much for developing their domestic markets but to acquire the technology to subvert international laws concerning patents and trade. The simplest way for anyone to do that is to buy up foreign companies one-by-one, use those companies as pure research and development resources while then flooding the international markets with domestically produced imitations that are of such poor quality that the original company has its reputation destroyed, and then those cheaper products are the only ones left available.

    Chinese metals for example, are almost always of such poor quality that the standards for American domestic consumption by companies that would be using these metals in manufacturing such as aerospace, cannot rely on the certifications of quality from those metal producers at all. As an example, there are specific formulas for various grades of steel as set by agreed-upon American, Canadian and European Governments, but those standards do not apply in China. So Chinese producers can be very loose in what they can label as a specific grade of steel, and certify it as that grade without meeting those basic formulas. Boeing refuses to use metals that are imported from China for example.

    The scandal a couple of years ago about the Japanese mis-certification of certain aluminium and non-ferrous grades, that is copper, bronzes etc, was done by a Japanese firm that had been previously bought out by a Chinese State-sponsored shell company, and the metals were being produced in bulk by Chinese companies and then sent to Japan for finishing into the various shapes purchased at the retail level by machine shops and the like, and exported to the rest of the world. In effect, the Chinese company was using that Japanese company as a middleman smuggling operation for metals that were then illegally certified for export to the United States and the European Union.

    All this really did was damage the reputation of that Japanese company, and the actual Chinese producer was sheltered by their domestic materials standards, as those metals had met them. It is specifically illegal to import Chinese Aluminium to the United States. It does not meet quality and formula standards, and the Chinese government owns the producers so they can undercut any worldwide market price. The guy that owns the largest aluminium producer in China has been shipping bulk aluminium to Mexico for storage there, literally millions of tons of it, and is waiting for that point in time where he could ship it to the United States without repercussions. Fat Donny and his little cabal are perfectly willing to destroy domestic producers by reducing or eliminating enforcement completely. They of course, call it “Eliminating Burdensome Government Regulations That Kill American Small Business”.

    The California State Government found this out the hard way when they allowed a Chinese engineering and construction firm to rebuild the Oakland Bay Bridge, and the steels used started rusting and breaking down literally within weeks of installation, necessitating their complete replacement, which almost doubled the cost of the original bid. If they had gone with a domestic company for that rebuild with domestically produced materials, the costs would have been much lower. But the Chinese company had the lowest bid and got the job, even though they hadn’t actually had much institutional corporate experience with such a project. Federal Laws regarding who could bid on and do such work were subverted and replaced back in the 1980s and early 90s that allowed this to happen.

    This is one of the reasons why the WTO was put into place. It created a legal tool to use in situations like this, but only after the fact. That is why it was considered such a clusterfuck at that time as it still is now. It did nothing to protect American companies from being underbid by foreign companies willing to low-ball such bids to get the work, and then come back after the fact with expectations of unprovable cost overruns being met by subsequent cash outlays on the part of the customer.

    The Chinese play the game pretty well. It’s unfortunate that the American Corporatists see no issue with using taxpayers money to subsidize foreign companies in their efforts to supplant domestic producers. I guess it’s all good as long as the right people in Congress get their palms greased.

  63. 63

    Another huge hole is blown in the central thesis of the Nunes memo:

    “Former State Department official Victoria Nuland told CBS News’ ‘Face the Nation’ that the dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele was brought to the State Department’s attention in July of 2016, which then shared the information with the FBI. … ‘[O]ur immediate reaction to that was, ‘This is not in our purview … [t]hat’s something for the FBI to investigate … we can’t evaluate this.'”

    She also suggested if Trump campaign members approached by the Russians had gone to the FBI, “we might not be in the mess we’re in today.”

    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/victoria-nuland-says-obama-state-dept-informed-fbi-of-reporting-from-steele-dossier/

    Roger Rabbit Commentary: This lays the blame where it should be.

  64. 64

    Another hammer blow falls on the Nunes strategy, and this is a BIG one: Trey Gowdy says the Nunes memo has “no impact” on the Russia investigation and doesn’t vindicate Trump.

    https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/04/politics/trey-gowdy-memo/index.html

    Roger Rabbit Commentary: Now wait for Drumpf defenders to spin Gowdy as a Clinton tool as they continue their unseemly attacks on the beating heart of American law enforcement …

    Meanwhile, Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) said he’s “not shocked” that panicky “elected officials” are resorting to “hyperbole and exaggerations” [as the walls close in on the Putin-Drumpf gang — RR].

  65. 65

    Three fatal Amtrak crashes in the last month.

    I suppose Newt’s @ 29 simple solution is “Stay away from Amtrak.”.

    But keep funding it, anyways, amirite?

  66. 66

    @65 Yeah, fly instead, planes never crash. Ever. But if a plane you’re riding on did crash, only the pilots would be killed. All the passengers would survive, just like in a train crash.

    And who needs mass transportation between East Coast urban centers, anyway? Highways work just fine.

    You did get one thing right, dumbfuck: Yes, we should keep it running. When you have a safety problem, you fix the safety problem, not shitcan the whole system.

    There’s perhaps an analogy to this, albeit a weak one, in the regulatory action the Fed took against Wells Fargo Bank on Friday. The Fed’s action is designed to fix the abuses and keep them from recurring, not put the bank under.

    But people of your persuasion don’t believe in regulation. Your argument is just let the market put bad banks out of business. After, not before, they’ve ripped of their customers. How his works is, after you’ve been ripped off, you know better than to do business with them.

    In the same way, after you’ve been killed on an Amtrak train, you know not to ride on it, and you’ll drive to work from Connecticut to Manhattan instead. In a manner of speaking.

    So, since you’re a much more astute investor than I am, let me ask you this: What would YOU do about WFC stock tomorrow — sell, hold, or buy more? I’m asking for your advice here. Because you’re all-knowing about everything pertaining to investing.

  67. 67

    She also suggested if Trump campaign members approached by the Russians had gone to the FBI, “we might not be in the mess we’re in today.”

    I think it helps to think about this in context beyond just the House majority’s efforts to obstruct justice with phony secret memos. If the campaign had gone to the FBI. Think about that.

    The most famous of these “approaches” that we know of, but certainly not the most serious criminally, occurred on June 9, 2016 just weeks ahead of the nominating convention. Trump was by this point assured to win the nomination. The RNC was by this point directly involved in the campaign and was set up in Trump Tower. So at the time of this “approach” this is the biggest, most important, and most visible political campaign operation in conservative American politics. Armies of paid staff, vast sums of money, private jets, chartered jets, armored limos, and multiple firms of specialty lawyers on call and on staff. Nothing is shoe string, and certainly not where Trump, his family, and Trump Tower are concerned. By this time they are billing both the campaign and the RNC record sums for office rents and other RE services. Everything is expensed. And no expense is to be spared.

    It is simply not in the nature of successful political campaigns and their operatives to be pessimistic and defeatist. So while it may be true that there was widespread skepticism at large regarding Trump’s prospects in the general, we can be very confident that within Trump Tower it was full steam ahead stoked with confidence of victory and a party in January. It would have been a lot to take in. And there would have been a great emphasis on not letting the campaign get ahead of itself, and to keep the focus first on planning a successful convention to boost the campaign toward surging poll numbers in the fall. But most of these folks are or were experienced pros who would have grasped the stakes immediately.

    And into that atmosphere suddenly walk some “random strangers” from Russia (from Russia!) offering their clandestine campaign support to the senior most members of the campaign.

    And they respond by 1) seeking to explore and advance that effort at support; and 2) doing everything they can think of to keep it a secret, including lying openly about it to anyone who asks; and 3) absolutely NOT reporting the approach to the FBI.

    Now come up with an innocent explanation for that.

  68. 68

    @ RR:

    Trump and Nunes have had their tighty whiteys in a twist from the get-go about Carter Page. Back in October 2016 was when the warrant was put down to monitor Page. In January of 2017, when Trump finally had access to all the government information, Trump started making the claims about how back in October Obama had had Trump Tower wiretapped.

    I think it is far more likely that Trump sees “someone who used to tangentially work for you is being watched” as “THEY’RE PUTTING SPY CAMS IN MY TOILET!” He is an utterly deluded moron, after all. He’s so utterly dishonest that he cannot see things in any other light.

    Last March, Nunes goes on his own freakout and has big public press conferences because he is given information about “People in the Trump administration who are UNDER SURVEILLANCE”. In retrospect, it is clear he was freaking out about Page’s FISA warrant at the time.

    Carter Page, like Flynn, is a big deal. Trump has clammed up anytime anyone talks about Flynn, he has made several attempts, some I think, very illegal moves to stop people from looking into Flynn.

    Flynn and Page are “where the bodies are buried” so to speak. Fat Donny et al know this full well, and they are foaming at the mouth and tripping over their shoelaces to keep anyone from sniffing around Page/Flynn at all. With their demonstrated inability to actually think about things, it is backfiring on them, and they just cannot fathom why this is the case.

    Stercore percusserit flabellum est.

  69. 69

    Carter Page was an only too willing “useful idiot” for the Russians..

    Greed driven dumbass and it was only too predictable he’d end up in the Drumpf tent.

    Maybe there’s something there.

    Super Bowl? meh.. If the Eagles are winning, I’ll turn it on in the 4th quarter.

  70. 70

    “He wanted to make the argument that we needed to look more positively at Russia’s economic reforms and Russia’s relationship with Central Asia,” the unnamed editor who corresponded with Page told Time, saying he came to know Page as a “kook.”

    This is what you get when you allow pure greed to set its own rules. Prostituted government. By the money, for the money, and of the money. Every other consideration isn’t even a concern.

    Fat Donny is Putin’s Bitch.

  72. 72

    @69 Me too. The Patriots have turned me into an Eagles fan for a day. I doubt that I’ll watch. Seldom do.

  73. 73

    This survey blows holes in GOP racist claims that poor people (i.e. blacks) hate cops.

    “A majority of Americans living in struggling communities … have respect for and confidence in the police who patrol their neighborhoods … 86 percent of people in struggling neighborhoods said they had some or a lot of respect for their local police.”

    http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireS.....e-52830847

  74. 74

    Another body blow to “Nunes memo” defenders:

    Former CIA Director John Brennan calls the memo “exceptionally partisan” and says Nunes “abused [his] office.”

    https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/04/politics/john-brennan-nunes-memo/index.html

    Roger Rabbit Commentary: By now, everyone with half a brain realizes this so-called “memo” is a partisan hit job and a scripted part of a calculated GOP cover up scheme. This party tried to protect Nixon, too. Their “law and order” rhetoric is a sick joke.

  77. 77

    65)CSX Trackage, and this particular Subdivision might be one the railroad is putting up for sale. It’s early, but from what I have heard so far, it could be a decision made by a dispatcher, probably done in Jacksonville, now.

  78. 78

    76,
    Captain Obvious resorts to the only thing he can to avoid being tagged a fucking treasonous liar… again.

    Give Shortbus an inch though and he’ll run a mile of Breitbart partisan lies. Biggest lie of all? That Shortbus is not a loyal Roypublican AM hate radio programmed meat robot.
    Doubt it? Review his weeks of FREECARTERPAGE! pleadings. Slandering the men and women who labor daily to protect us from terrorist attacks for partisan gain. Disgusting.

  79. 79

    @1 Are you suggesting that Watergate was more about petty politics than a break in, and a stupid cover-up? Or it’s ok when Democrats do it (and they did and have)? Or the old it’s ok to do dirty tricks just don’t get caught? If you do get caught make sure you have the gavel. Is that todays lesson?

    Only impeachment that almost led to removal from office and the Republicans had the gavel, and huge control of the house and senate. And Johnson was a former Democrat. (Fair argument if it had not been Johnson it would have been Lincoln to be impeached.) I think that example undermines your case. Though the Clinton impeachment does strengthen your argument, but the Senate could have taken a page from the Johnson impeachment process, and not acted on the House’s impeachment as that Senate did on the first go around. Then Johnson stirred up the wasps nest.

  80. 80

    @5 You leave an important fact out on the President’s wife being eligible for removal. Once you get a green card those rules don’t apply. Play by the green card rules, and you can become a citizen like she is today. She is totally safe. What you are pointing out is a disparity in resources that a rich gay or gal has over someone who is even just middle class, and their ability to make their honey into a American citizen. Having money and connections helps. Marrying your honey counts a lot, which is why there is such controversy over gay marriage. As some marriages have been shams in the past, and it’s always difficult to prove them, but gay marriages have a greater chance of shams when they are of foreigners (watch the Birdcage..at least all the gay people are the heroes in that one, but gets to the heart of what the issue) and it will spread the governments resources so that even easy to prove shams get through, and the foreigner will get his citizenship and the filing for divorce the next day will surprise not one, but the appropriate enforcement action will not happen. (Yes if the marriage can be shown a sham the fraudster can loose their citizenship, one of the few limited ways anyone can loosed US citizenship.)

  81. 81

    @7 Hemingway was a Republican in Spain. Of course that would make him your kind of a Republican, and show how your twisting facts to take cheap shots.

    As it nearly everyone of his books has at least 1 suicide, and nearly all have death. Suicide ran in the family, and this is not the first book speculating on his suicide. Could be as simple as he could never go back to Cuba and drink rum on the beach. A pretty significant loss if you ask me. though rabbits may not understand.

  82. 82

    @8 Your an supposedly an attorney. There is enough to this that if you had to go to trial on this I’d say you would be pretty damned concerned about the judge making a 4th Amendment ruling and scuttling your entire case if you were the Prosecutor and feeling mighty good if you were the Defense attorney. Right not it’s all politics, but should this actually turn into a criminal case and it all falls apart in the courtroom it’s going to make a lot of folks in government look bad and foolish and your hype here look bad, and foolish and you should know better.

    You can make intelligent guesses as to how a trial judge might rule, but in general there is enough here to say the case is highly flawed, no matter the politics. That should be enough for you all to drop this like the piece of shit it is.

  83. 83

    82,
    We’ve been over this before dumbshit. Just because the truth peg can’t be jammed into your treason hole doesn’t change a thing.

    The exclusionary rule hinges on an app being fatally flawed. A warrant application merely having flaws would not be sufficient. Carter Page has spent the past five years lifting his skirt to every passing Russian spy. Your beloved Orange Cheesburger-hole named as his National Security Adviser a guy who had spent the previous year offering to trade Russian sanction removal for campaign assistance and “consulting” contracts. And when his pal got caught, President Hooker-Pee did everything he could think of to shut it all down, including obstruct justice. There’s no getting around that. Vague insinuations of bias don’t even come close.

    You and the rest of the 63 million racist meat bags who voted for President Stupid need this to be over only because the truth of it is more than you can take. I’ve always accepted that there were huge numbers of fat, lazy idiots like you moldering away in trailers digging through your laundry piles for loose fitting pants and shoes that don’t need to be tied. And until a year ago last November I told myself you were harmless. Fuck that. You people are a menace to national security.

  84. 84

    @10 The same could be said of all the Democratic Representatives and Senators that never read the full Health Care Law. Sure they have staff, but it’s not at all unusual for the folks we voted in not to have read the bill they are voting on, or have reviewed the underlying information, ect. They have any managers problem of not having enough time, and then gotta go dial for dollars for 10 to 40 or more hours a week. Our reps are telemarketers as their second job.

  85. 85

    @11 Good politics on his part, as actually there might be something in the HA rules that is not enforced. Not that anyone expects all the niceties of saying your sources on here. You do quote sometimes and clearly there is no reference to who you are quoting. So you would flunk out of journalism, and if you do that on something to a judge, there are other repercussions. Still good politics on Puddy’s part. Got you having to defend yourself.

  86. 86

    @12 Could be the sex. There is this political theory that all politics is about sex, maybe Republicans are having great sex.

  88. 88

    @14 Maybe she wishes she has one, but she a public figure, on a book tour so I guess open to all this, and she is a big girl. I don’t think she needs you defending her RR.

  89. 89

    @19 I don’t think it’s constitutional for the United States to have star courts. Obviously prosecutor like reasonable judges rather than ornery, irascible ones, maybe we need some more of the kind judge Prosecutors don’t like. Or at least ones willing to ask why are wanting me to issue a warrant against someone on the team of a man running for President, or is the President elect. Why haven’t you arrested his Russian handler, or the other Russians involved here? Are you going to arrest them? When? Now these rascal kind of judges are the bane of Prosecutors, but they protect the rights of Americans. They protect your rights and mine, and the that should be the question in all this mess. The real important points in the this are being painted over by the politics. Then again the DOJ, the FBI prefer pet judges, as does any State Attorney General, and they prefer their kind of judge to be sitting in Star Courts. Thus giving the state more power. And giving the shadow state more power.

  90. 90

    87,
    He won’t stop until we take up a collection and buy him more coloring books.

  93. 93

    @20 And the Patriot Act significantly weakened protections put in place after the Nixon white house. Also all those Democrats actually voted to expand and keep in place parts of the Patriot Act giving one Donald Trump the power to spy on his political opponents, just like Obama apparently did. One would think that not one Democrat would vote to give Donald Trump that kind of power with this Russian investigation going on, yet they did, which indicates they know this all a sham. And they like government to have power.

  94. 94

    @23 And more fun if you are into that kind of thing. Our VP Pence is not. Or only with his wife. They could be quite the kinky couple, and no other Mistress is going to get to check out a new slave over dinner. He’s owned.

  96. 96

    @26 Then you are like the great mass of people since Einstein stated only he, and two or three other people alive at the time truly understood the theory of relativity.

  97. 97

    @82 Trump won’t be tried in a court of law, and there’s no exclusionary rule in the court of public opinion.

  98. 98

    @29 Germany and many countries in Europe have a similar problem, and it’s because their trains are electric and very quiet. It’s entirely possible for an occupied pedestrian to step into the path of train in an appropriate location simple because they didn’t hear the train. This is also one problem with electric cars. With more of them we will probably have a rash of vehicle and pedestrian accidents.

  101. 101

    @35 Of course if you all get the war you seem to want with Russia, that will involve all 300,000,000 plus Americans.

    And while you have Representatives floating impeachment, when are they are going to float Declarations of War, they ought to be interconnected if you all are your going to put your money where your mouths are.

  102. 102

    @36 Shit myself wondering what my underfed troops are going to do. And those troops have the anti aircraft guns I like using on my opposition.

  103. 103

    @101 “Of course if you all get the war you seem to want with Russia”

    It’s because of posts like this that people here don’t respect you.

  104. 104

    @39 First of all your sister maybe adding in social security and Medicare. Whether or not she is doing better than you, those at a chunk. She has property taxes, or she pays rent and the landlord pays them, but she is ultimately paying those. She maybe adding in state taxes. Maybe she is adding in the more hidden like the gas tax, alcohol, ect. While she is probably exaggerating that she is paying 50% it may not an extreme exaggeration. And yes if she is part of upper middle class, and beyond she is paying a lot more in income tax on the income on hitting over $100,000. As her brother you could ask and recommend a good tax accountant if you think she is overpaying.

  105. 105

    @40 That is $75. That should be good for a couple of movie nights more if you are willing to go to the equivalent of the dollar movie theatre. You could rent a movie and use microwave popcorn and stay home for some quality family time.

  106. 106

    @41 You are making a lot of assumptions. Then again you are in New York, why wouldn’t he just put a ton of VX gas on a one way trip to New York arbor on a transport ship, or send a couple of sailors on shore with some nasty disease. These are well within the North Korean capability. To successfully hit anywhere in the United States the north is going to have to launch at least 10 missiles. They will have to hit targets in Guam, Hawaii, Alaska. Their stated targets include Houston, but oddly nothing about New York, though they are definitely unhappy with the UN.

    So if you get a sniffle or should your eyes dilate, and you suddenly feel faint a then pass out just know it could be from North Korea with love.

  108. 108

    @55 The sewer pipe is usually the weak point in castle or fortification construction. Same with prisons, though getting into the food handling area and going out with the food prep crew is pretty popular.

  109. 109

    @56 They would have to include Mexico and Canada in their attack. And there maybe some exaggeration after all the industrial military complex may have it’s fingers in the report, and maybe exaggerating the effectiveness of such an attack. Though if you live or keep your electronics in a faraday cage it probably will survive such an attack. The bigger reason to protect the grid is because the sun can way outdo anything the North Korean’s can do. And the thing that will keep them from doing anything assuming they are rational is the pay back. Meanwhile they have opened the box, and made themselves a legitimate target for our nuclear weapons, and other weapons of mass destruction, while in the past only the impending defeat of South Korean forces would mean the use of those types of weapons unless the North Koreans were to use such a weapon.
    The North Korean endgame is for Kim to stay in power, and getting the US off the peninsula. Then you can guess what would happen. And sooner or later the North Koreans will be reminded they are just a renegade province of a neighboring country.

  110. 110

    @60 A graduate of the US Naval Academy is spying for the Russians? Is this some kind of red scare? Is the cold war back?

  112. 112

    @61 There is always opium. Took the British who are always willing to not be nice to overcome the Chinese, and not play by their emperors rules, and show that the British were competent barbarians. China only recently got Hong Kong back, with promises that Hong Kong will be allowed some degree of independence. For how much longer?

  113. 113

    @104. Dude you make no sense. I make more money than her. More than twice as much as her today. Bottom line people have no clue what they pay in taxes because they are stupid. And I suppose the taxes she does pay she’d prefer to pay none for the lights that light her street, the garbage that they collect from her, the police ad fire department that protect her, etc.

    Let’s say she made 100,000 dollars and she ends up with 80000 after federal tax and then maybe 75000 after SS and Medicare taxes and then she has 12000 in a mortgage she’s left 63,000. Let’s say she’s taxed 10% for sales tax, assuming she saves no money in a bank, that’s 6300 which is high end of any sales tax. That’s about 31%. So add another 6000 in property taxes: that’s now 37%. Like I said 50% is an exaggeration.

    What is the right % for her lights on the roads, the roads she drives on, the school grants her kids got, the fire department and police department. So maybe she over paid a bit, but I’d say she got a better deal than she thinks she got.

  114. 114

    @106 his love will be a lot better than the love a back stabbing fellow American. I’ll take his love over the love of some fake freedom fuck.

  117. 117

    @113

    And when she turns 63 or whatever the date is she starts to get some of that money back in the form of SS and Medicare insurance

  119. 119

    @78 Actually AMTRAC actually may touch my life than most of the stuff you people argue about on here. Often I see the CASCADE train going south or north while I’m working. If there is really a environment there where they are ignoring safety, that just might impact my day. And I rather like AMTRAC, and I have traveled on AMTRAC and enjoyed it more than flying or taking Greyhound. The food is better airline food if expensive.

    Having an accident with a bunch of Republican congressmen on board is not a good moment. Another accident the next day. Congress may do something, and hopefully it will not be to scrap AMTRAC, something some Republicans would like to do. And some Democrats are less than thrilled with AMTRAC. There has overall not been a lot of political support to expand AMTRAC or create a high speed train system. Even expanding where it makes complete it would make the most sense…ie a similar system up and down some or all of the west coast as exists on the east coast faces steep headwinds, and with the US producing 10 million barrels of oil a day, not a lot of incentive to support alternative’s to the national highway system.
    I was trying to invite a conversation to see if there is real support for AMTRAC or if some of that support has gone away. It appears to have gone away as there seems to be little support on this page for AMTRAC or other public transportation on rails.

  121. 121

    @106 If it’s so easy to do, why hasn’t someone done it? There are plenty of terrorists who want to.

  123. 123

    121,
    Yeah. There really ought to be, like some kind of law enforcement agency or something. You know, like on a nation wide scale. Limited in their jurisdiction. But specifically trained, regulated, and tasked with preventing foreign terrorist attacks and espionage.

    Oh well.

  124. 124

    Good grief! Enough already.

    “Devin Nunes might release five more memos that claim DOJ worked to undermine Trump”

    “There are several areas of concern where federal agencies used government resources to try to create a narrative and influence the election,” a Republican congressperson briefed on Nunes’ investigation told Axios. “Some have suggested coordination with Hillary Clinton operatives, Blumenthal and Shearer, to back up the false narrative.”

    https://www.rawstory.com/2018/02/revealed-devin-nunes-might-release-five-memos-claim-doj-worked-undermine-trump/

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